Learning The History Of Librivox

Comments about LibriVox? Suggestions to improve things? News?
Basquetteur
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Post by Basquetteur »

Hi!,

Thank you for all these suggestions.

I think by looking at the thread librivox statistics I might also put the second highest number of audiobooks released in a month. I have not tried to trace it back right now, but it is mentioned recently there.

I am now thinking of other possible milestones more related to contents or traceable to invividual books, and there are many that come to my mind. I come to too many in fact.

For example by genre or series.

In Prose:
Shakespeare's Monologue Collection, reaching 15th volume
Short Science Fiction Collection, reaching 75 (current is 77)
Short Ghost and Horror Collection, reaching 50
Reaching the number of 150 dramatic readings (at present librivox.org catalog indicates 168). But I would have to check which one it was.

I think a series of other milestones would be the 200th volume of the Short Poetry Collection.
The fortnightly and weekly series.
In German, the Sammlung deutscher Gedichte 30th edition (current volume is 36)
The 10th "compilation de poèmes" in French, current is 13th.

Multilingual Short Works Collection Poetry and Prose, the milestone is when it reached the 25th volume. Now the series is at 28th.

In German:
Sammlung kurzer deutscher Prosa (short german prose) reaching number 50 (current number is 55)

I would not put shorter series or ones that are stopped. For example the Multilingual Language Learning Collection stopped at volume 5, and no new volume is being produced, i think.

I would mark the entry of each of these series by indicating when the milestone was reached the name of the book if relevant or different than the number in the series, with a link to the actual book corresponding of the milestone (the date would be that of publication).

Other possible types of milestones:
The number of languages recordings of the Multilingual Recordings of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I think the milestone would be 40 languages?. There are more thean 50 but some languages are repeated?.

In another vein, the highest number of monthly views in archive.org/LibriVox was 31,662,581 in April 2020, see https://archive.org/details/librivoxaudio?query=gesame&sin=&sort=-publicdate, in Tab ABOUT

The idea would be to give a good picture of the wide contents in Librivox with these milestones.

Surely there are other additional relevant or more interesting milestones.

I will be drafting sentences for some of these ones I have mentioned in this post. And I may be dropping also some of them. May be not more than 10 or 15 should be added.

Cheers,

Basquetteur
Basquetteur
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Post by Basquetteur »

Hi!

As promised, I have now included some more milestones, besides the ones, mentioned earlier. I have tried to reword the ones with comments in earlier posts.

These milestones are intended to complete the history in the librivox wiki, now stopping at February 2010.

I am sure some other relevant milestones can be added. And may be some can be dropped.

Cheers,

Basquetteur


October 26, 2011 - LibriVox releases its 5000th audiobook: Roderick Hudson (https://librivox.org/roderick-hudson-by-henry-james/) by Henry James.
February 2, 2012, Librivox publishes La Batalla de los Arapiles, the last book of the ten corresponding to the first series of Episodios Nacionales by B. Pérez Galdós, https://librivox.org/la-batalla-de-los-arapiles-by-benito-perez-galdos/
December 31, 2013, LibriVox released 1083 audiobooks, the highest number in a calendar year (2013), up to then: viewtopic.php?f=24&t=19942&start=915
August 6, 2016 Librivox reaches 10,000 audiobooks at its 11th anniversary, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/category/monthly-picks/page/15/
August 9, 2018 LibriVox reaches 12,000 audiobooks at its 13th anniversary, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/category/monthly-picks/page/9/
November 11, 2018, the Compilation de poèmes released its 10th audiobook, https://librivox.org/compilation-de-poemes-010-by-various/
August 9, 2019 LibriVox reaches 13,000 audiobooks at its 14th anniversary, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/category/monthly-picks/page/6/
September 19, 2019, the Sammlung kurzer deutscher Prosa releases its 50th audiobook, https://librivox.org/sammlung-kurzer-deutscher-prosa-050-by-various/
February 1, 2020, the Short Poetry Collection released its volume 200, https://librivox.org/short-poetry-collection-200-by-various/
April 30, 2020, the highest number of monthly views in archive.org/LibriVox is reached with 31,662,581 views, see https://archive.org/details/librivoxaudio?query=gesame&sin=&sort=-publicdate, Tab ABOUT
May 30, 2020 LibriVox releases the 7th version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, https://librivox.org/alices-adventures-in-wonderland-version-7-by-lewis-carroll/
June, 3, 2020, LibriVox reaches 14,000 audiobooks, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/2020/06/03/librivox-celebrates-14000-audiobooks/
July 28, 2020, the Multilingual Short Works Collection - Poetry & Prose released its 25th volume, https://librivox.org/multilingual-short-works-collection-025-poetry-prose-by-various/
August 9, 2020 LibriVox turns 15 and reaches 14,200 audiobooks, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/category/monthly-picks/page/3/
September 17, 2020 the Children's Short Works publishes its 44th volume, https://librivox.org/childrens-short-works-vol-040-by-various/
December 2, 2020 the Shakespeare Monologue Collection reaches its volume no. 15, https://librivox.org/shakespeare-monologues-collection-vol-15-multilingual-by-william-shakespeare/
December 31, 2020, LibriVox released 1336 audiobooks, the highest number in a calendar year (2020): viewtopic.php?f=24&t=19942&start=930
February 9, 2021 the Short Science Fiction Collection reaches its volume no. 75, https://librivox.org/short-science-fiction-collection-075-by-various/
February, 14, 2021, LibriVox reaches 15,000 audiobooks, post in LibriVox blog: https://librivox.org/2021/02/14/librivox-celebrates-15000-audiobooks/
February, 14, 2021, LibriVox has audiobooks in 43 languages besides English, and there were more than 10,850 readers who contributed, same entry in the blog
March 11, 2021, the Sammlung deutscher Gedichte released its 35th volume, https://librivox.org/sammlung-deutscher-gedichte-035-by-various/
March, 31, 2021 during this March LibriVox released 186 audiobooks, the highest number in a single month. This was one of the occasional cleanup months dedicated to concentrating efforts to finish books lagging behind, see thread: viewtopic.php?f=24&t=85943
April 7, 2021 the Short Ghost and Horror Collection reaches its volume no. 50, https://librivox.org/short-ghost-and-horror-collection-050-by-various/
Kalamareader
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Post by Kalamareader »

GraceBuchanan wrote: March 13th, 2021, 10:30 am
AdhiraamBose wrote: March 9th, 2021, 7:33 am This is just a question out of Curiosity.

As an Individual of this era,I was made to DownLoad AudioBooks from Librivox due to my inability to Experience AudioBooks from Expensive Media like Audible and StoryTel.

But,what were the Odds then(In 2005),when Librivox was Found?
What Forces then made People Opt for Librivox?
Were there any Expensive AudioBook Media like Audible and StoryTel?Or,was there any Other Factor?
Before 2005, when I wanted to listen to an audiobook, it was usually too expensive to consider buying from a bookstore. It cost more than the hardcover edition, and came as a box full of cassette tapes. Sets of CDs were even more expensive when they became available. Library copies of the cassette tapes and CDs were usually damaged. Some audiobooks were available in other formats for other machines, but I never used them. I got most of my music on cassettes and then CDs from subscription services. I don't recall any audiobooks by subscription then.

As 2005 came nearer, I still didn't download a book from the internet because my internet connection was too unreliable and my computer hard drive was too small. Eventually I had a tiny portable device that held carefully-selected songs, and the capacity increased over the years until it was large enough to hold one book.

In 2005 my cell phone was only for emergency use for brief calls to and from close friends and family members. I was still using a cassette tape recorder to record books for loved ones.

Some time around 2015 I shopped for a new cassette recorder and/or microphone and discovered mics sold for use with a computer. That's when I discovered LibriVox and its forums loaded with helpful suggestions.

I hope this helps you get a feel for how audiobook availability has changed. I hope more people will share their memories of what the audiobook market was like in 2005.
I'll go back a little farther than you. In about 1980 or so I was driving long distances (3-400 miles per day) and I liked to read books, but as you said, the normal sources didn't work well, even libraries didn't have many cassette tapes at all. I found a company in Salt Lake City which would, for a fee, send you a book on cassette, and after you read it, you would send it back (return postage on them), and then they would send you another one that you chose from their catalogue. I would set a portable cassette player on my lap and put on a set of cheap earphones and listen to the books that way. I then went to CDs, which my company provided, and did that until I retired in 2010 (about 3 million miles later [seriously]). I can't count how many books I have listened to.

And now I have the opportunity to contribute to the wealth of books for others to listen to. :D

Wayne
Wayne
We never really grow up, we just learn how to act in public. :mrgreen:
GraceBuchanan
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Post by GraceBuchanan »

Kalamareader wrote: January 9th, 2022, 8:04 pm
I'll go back a little farther than you. In about 1980 or so I was driving long distances (3-400 miles per day) and I liked to read books, but as you said, the normal sources didn't work well, even libraries didn't have many cassette tapes at all. I found a company in Salt Lake City which would, for a fee, send you a book on cassette, and after you read it, you would send it back (return postage on them), and then they would send you another one that you chose from their catalogue. I would set a portable cassette player on my lap and put on a set of cheap earphones and listen to the books that way. I then went to CDs, which my company provided, and did that until I retired in 2010 (about 3 million miles later [seriously]). I can't count how many books I have listened to.

And now I have the opportunity to contribute to the wealth of books for others to listen to. :D

Wayne
Wayne, that's great! The UT company must have been such a find! And then your company kept you well supplied!

You reminded me that during the mid and late 70s I drove with a cassette player on the passenger seat, running on batteries. Around 1990, my kids held the cassette player, and then the CD player, in the back seat.

Hooray for all that each of us brings to LV!
My LibriVox publications

All Listeners: I welcome all feedback including word-perfect proofing
lurcherlover
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Post by lurcherlover »

Actually in the mid 1970's I edited audiobooks read for the blind by well known actors/actresses provided on cassette. I copied these to reel to reel tape and edited, then copied back to cassette. This cassette was then copied back at HQ and sent out to blind listeners. It was hard work!
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